Beware of BioWare!

[DABhand]

Originally Posted by AstralWanderer

As an aside, please don't make a habit of this - it makes it harder for others to quote the relevant parts of your posts.

I.e. More work for you?

Please provide some examples where a publisher has given a phone number specifically for activation then (at best, all I've seen is an email option). The only example I know of is Microsoft's Windows Activation and I wouldn't consider that a game.

Two Worlds. Earth 2160. To name a few. There is more out there.

And how does this allow someone to activate if they wish to keep their gaming PC offline?

Would be stupid of them to buy something that only requires an internet connection when they have none wouldn't it. Who is at fault there? The end user for not reading the warning on the box.

The point I was making is that there are people who don't have fixed line Internet access and never will due to either living/working in restricted areas (e.g. military barracks) or having to constantly be on the move (e.g. a mobile crane operator). At best, online access would be via a local library which would be totally useless for activation purposes. And with mobile phones, Internet access may be charged at extortionate rates (for example, the mobile network I am with charges about US$4/MB sent - a bargain compared to their previous US$10/MB rate).

Again not the fault of the developer/publisher. If someone buys a product that needs online authentication (if no phone option available which mostly there is) and they know they travel around the place. Nobody's fault but their own for buying it.

The reason: "Credit charge chargeback" was stated 6 words before your reply. Reading a post before hitting Reply might help avoid missing the obvious...No, it isn't talk - it is a simple (and pretty darn obvious) observation. Publishers will log the IP address used for each activation (see Stardock's activation page linked above) and in many cases, geolocation can be used to provide an approximate physical address. If you have something that activates daily (as Windows Genuine Advantage did) on a laptop you carry with you, it should be pretty clear that this would provide a reasonable record of your whereabouts.

And it is not illegal for companies to collect data in most jurisdictions either. In many cases, they don't even need to make it clear in their EULA. And aside from technically minded customers, I very much doubt anyone is monitoring them - law enforcement in particular has far bigger things to worry about.

Not all IP addy's are static just remember that. And the permabanning was mentioned by you, do NOT forget this. Now here is a legal matter, If say someone is banned but went out and bought another copy of a game to make a new account, they cannot ban this new account without good reason, and the reason of being banned before is not valid.

"Credit charge chargeback" what the feck is this? You trying to say banned because a Credit Card is invalid or something? Can you speak english please lol

Now you have proven you only know things you have heard and read about. But not read well.

It is illegal for any software to receive information via its software of anything other than the data attributed with the software.

Only time they can see your files on your PC is if your silly enough to share your HD on a P2P server.

And which land of legal milk and honey do you live in where such a provision exists? If a company goes bankrupt, their only obligation is to their creditors (and staff, depending on legislation). They have none to their customers - indeed, for USians, the beloved DMCA would likely prevent a developer from releasing an activation-removal patch since they would need the permission of the now-bankrupt publisher (who almost certainly couldn't give a fig about past customers).

Again your only talking about hearsay things you have read or heard others saying. Actually looking into this subject more may indeed reveal a wider prospective to the whole scenario.

You seem to forget that buy purchasing software, such as any that requires online activation or to be online to play full stop, once installed and you agree with the EULA you are in a contract with yourself and the publisher. If they are going bust they HAVE to give a way for the game to be usable after this event. Or else they would find themselves in hot, infact very hot water.

[Joe Forster/STA]

Originally Posted by DABhand

I.e. More work for you?

Yes. Use an answering style that is easy to read for everyone (not only "you", the other person in the discussion). See the Netiquette for general guidelines.

Originally Posted by DABhand

You seem to forget that buy purchasing software, such as any that requires online activation or to be online to play full stop, once installed and you agree with the EULA you are in a contract with yourself and the publisher.

And you seem to forget that, when the company goes down, that contract will become obsolete. Or is there an extra paragraph in the EULA saying that you may call the CEO in his house for technical support if the authentication servers go down for, let's say, an "unreasonable amount of time"? EULA's are especially known to disclaim all kinds of responsibility from the company!

[!HaGaR!]

And you seem to forget that, when the company goes down, that contract will become obsolete. Or is there an extra paragraph in the EULA saying that you may call the CEO in his house for technical support if the authentication servers go down for, let's say, an "unreasonable amount of time"? EULA's are especially known to disclaim all kinds of responsibility from the company!

Well, I see a need here to change the rules of the gcw. IF a company goes down or activation servers went down (is there any example yet?), cracks should be allowed which DOES circumvent online activation - because the activation is not possible anymore.

No piracy in these cases I think, because he company whos selling the software/game is no more...

Just 2 cents... And, in some way, the discussion here is obsolet. Talked about that a millions of time. Everyone hates the Biosshock protection. Very many people hate steam. Well, I also do. But, I am the owner of half life 2, bioshock and some others. Guess what? I hate myself for buying them, but I couldn´t resist playing them. If you can blame anyone for anything, than the fact that we couldn´t resist buying these titles. Period.

Well, tired and bad english... Above sentences may be awful. Thx for reading them anyway.

Good n8.

Edit: Sorry, somehow wrecked the qoute. Hope you may understand it anyway.

[Joe Forster/STA]

Originally Posted by !HaGaR!

Well, I see a need here to change the rules of the gcw. IF a company goes down or activation servers went down (is there any example yet?), cracks should be allowed which DOES circumvent online activation - because the activation is not possible anymore.

A good idea for the future.

[DABhand]

Originally Posted by Joe Forster/STA

And you seem to forget that, when the company goes down, that contract will become obsolete. Or is there an extra paragraph in the EULA saying that you may call the CEO in his house for technical support if the authentication servers go down for, let's say, an "unreasonable amount of time"? EULA's are especially known to disclaim all kinds of responsibility from the company!

Yes EULA's are a pain, but when your in a contract your in a contract.

Now imagine if Blizzard say for some weird reason went bust, they have to provide a means for people to play World of Warcraft, that is Law.

A huge massive fine on top of bankruptcy vs bankruptcy and a small server program for people to use to make own servers etc, I think they would choose option 2.

Dont forget just because they go bankrupt, a huge fine can still be made onto them which would be recovered via sale of company etc.

[wolfsrain]

Have you seen what happened with all the MMORPGs that disapperared in the last ten years? I never seen any company providing a mean to play the games later, after the servers were shutdown. Motor City Online, Planetscape, the list it's pretty long. I've never seen any law kicking in. And it should be. One of the last games that suffered the very same fate was Auto Assault. Shutdown, but no servers for the people who paid hard money, for a couple of years, to play their favorite game, after the servers were closed.
And I agree, the publisher should provide a meaning to circumvent the online activation, after, let's say, two years since the game launch. After two years most of the games are pretty dead(unless they are backed up by a strong modding community), so there would be no reason for them to keep the online activation around.

[AstralWanderer]

Originally Posted by DABhand

Two Worlds. Earth 2160. To name a few. There is more out there.

Very much the exception though - and to judge from threads like this they don't seem to work too well.

Originally Posted by DABhand

Would be stupid of them to buy something that only requires an internet connection when they have none wouldn't it. Who is at fault there?

Depends on the information supplied prior to purchase. Most boxes I've seen only mention activation in very small print and if you purchase online, you are reliant on the webpage description. In both cases, it can be quite easy to miss such a requirement (note in particular how many Half Life 2 purchasers were caught out, finding that they could not play until Valve started allowing activations).

Originally Posted by DABhand

Again not the fault of the developer/publisher.

Well it is their fault if their copy protection stops purchasers from being able to use their software. Following your line of reasoning it presumably would be the customer's fault if their CD/DVD drive was not compatible with SecuRom or if they had any software installed that StarForce took a dislike to? This is about the consequences of online activation, many of which may not be immediately obvious (your posts in particular show a touching, albeit greatly misplaced, faith in the ability of the legal system to counter such issues).

Originally Posted by DABhand

Not all IP addy's are static just remember that. And the permabanning was mentioned by you, do NOT forget this.

And your point is?...

Originally Posted by DABhand

Now here is a legal matter, If say someone is banned but went out and bought another copy of a game to make a new account, they cannot ban this new account without good reason, and the reason of being banned before is not valid.

If you read most EULA's (Steam's especially - "Valve may terminate your Account or a particular Subscription for any conduct or activity that Valve believes is illegal, constitutes a Cheat, or which otherwise negatively affects the enjoyment of Steam by other Subscribers. You acknowledge that Valve is not required to provide you notice before terminating your Subscriptions(s) and/or Account...") you will find that there is, in effect, no requirement for companies to have a good reason (or any proof of misconduct) before terminating online accounts.

Yes, you can work around a ban by purchasing another copy of the game in question. In Steam's case however, you would have to re-purchase every item requiring activation - so if you had US$200 worth of games on your account you'd have to shell out another US$200. If you don't see the problems with that, then you're either ridiculously wealthly - or Daddy hasn't found out about you using his credit card online...

Originally Posted by DABhand

"Credit charge chargeback" what the feck is this?

Google is your friend...

Originally Posted by DABhand

can you speak english please lol

Nice to see some irony from you here - though doubtless unintended on your part.

Originally Posted by DABhand

It is illegal for any software to receive information via its software of anything other than the data attributed with the software.

Unless you can actually quote (and preferably) link to the relevant legislation, statements like this are nothing more than a statement of opinion. And given the wide range of examples of software that collects private data (trying Googling ComScore) and ISPs that sell users' web history (trying Googling NebuAd), thinking that your privacy is protected legally (if you live in the United States, it generally isn't) is dangerously naive.

Originally Posted by DABhand

Only time they can see your files on your PC is if your silly enough to share your HD on a P2P server.

Now that is a foolish statement - any software you run and allow Internet access for can report on what files you have present, your system configuration or system activity (last webpages visited, last commands typed, etc) and such data could be encrypted in transit to prevent users from running packet sniffers to see what was happening. Some companies may be up-front about what information they collect, but that is no guarantee that all will.

Originally Posted by DABhand

If they are going bust they HAVE to give a way for the game to be usable after this event. Or else they would find themselves in hot, infact very hot water.

As others have noted, bankrupt companies have no legal obligations to their customers (obvious example: technical support contracts which cease when a vendor goes out of business). Unless another company chooses to acquire those obligations, customers have no legal remedy whatsoever (yes, you could try suing a bankrupt company but even if you received a judgement in your favour, they would have no assets to cover it - if they did, they wouldn't be bankrupt in the first place!).

[TippeX]

Originally Posted by AstralWanderer

any software you run and allow Internet access for can report on what files you have present, your system configuration or system activity (last webpages visited, last commands typed, etc) and such data could be encrypted in transit to prevent users from running packet sniffers to see what was happening.

a skilled person would be able to figure out what was sent.. if it was personal information like the persons name, cc details, whatever do you not think that this information about 'program xyz reports your name, pc information, dogs name, cats name, grannys age.. blah blah blah to the company when you register' would be on the internet pretty damned quickly?

when you buy something in the shop with a credit card, does that shop also not have your name, credit card number (and probably access to your address)? there is nothing different...

if a game did record personal information and sent it when you registered / logged onto their server it would be pretty damned stupid... and then you would also be pretty damned stupid for puting your real name and other details on the pc...

the protection companies have better things to do, and while it might be a nice argument to stop people using the protection there is no foundation in it..

as for the data being encrypted 'in transit', it has to be plain text at one point in time for it to be stored and then encrypted, a skilled reverse engineer could find it by simply backtracing buffers when the data is actually sent out...

paranoia is pretty common on the internet, however paranoia and bullshit seem to prevail on forums when the word 'online activation' is mentioned...

[AstralWanderer]

Originally Posted by TippeX

a skilled person would be able to figure out what was sent..

If the data is encrypted? Forget it! Even a skilled cryptanalyst could take 1-2 years to decipher strongly-encrypted content.

Originally Posted by TippeX

when you buy something in the shop with a credit card, does that shop also not have your name, credit card number (and probably access to your address)?

No they do not. They'll have your name and credit card details only - which is why many ask for an address separately for marketing or product warranty mailings.

Originally Posted by TippeX

if a game did record personal information and sent it when you registered / logged onto their server it would be pretty damned stupid.

Nonetheless it has happened. Blizzard did this with StarCraft 10 years ago (in this case, extracting user names and email addresses from the Windows Registry).

Originally Posted by TippeX

the protection companies have better things to do

Really? And on what experience do you base this judgement? Do you work for one such company?

If having "better things to do" was their main criteria, most protection companies would be closing down. Their products don't actually benefit anyone (cost and inconvenience to developers, further inconvenience to users, little to no perceptible effect on piracy) but they play on the fears of publishers in order to make their living. In their eyes, the end customer is a resource to be exploited (and often demonised as someone who would pirate at the drop of a hat if not for protection system X) so if a little extra profit can be made by harvesting and marketing personal data, their main concern would likely be covering themselves with a open-ended EULA.

There is plenty of monitoring online already (financial sites like Paypal or American Express supplying visitor data to Omniture, retailers reporting purchases to ShopZilla, Nextag or Coremetrics, smaller sites using Google Analytics) so this is a well established (and presumably profitable) business. It is only a small step for a company using compulsory online activation system to contribute to (and benefit from) this.

Originally Posted by TippeX

as for the data being encrypted 'in transit', it has to be plain text at one point in time for it to be stored and then encrypted, a skilled reverse engineer could find it by simply backtracing buffers when the data is actually sent out...

If cracking encryption was that simple, then nobody would rely on it. As long as a verified algorithm is implemented properly (and that certainly can be harder than it looks), it isn't going to give up its crown jewels when someone fires up SoftIce or anything similar. In the case of pre-existing data (which is what is under discussion) there would be no need to store cleartext separately anyway - just encrypt and send. You could use other software to monitor (and restrict) file and registry access, but this would only be feasible for the most technically expert users.

[TippeX]

erm i actually do know what im talking about, i've reversed crypto crap before.. it has to be plain at one part (the start), backtracking buffers, breakpoint on memory access, you will find it... so i suggest you actually learn about what you're talking about and don't assume people reading this don't know more than you... they do...

all it takes is 1 person with the skill to see what gets sent and then it'll be all over the internet if its 'personal' data.. i've yet to see such a claim related to ANY protection used on games...

you cite 10 years ago.. you're living in the dark ages, things matured since then, laws came into play... (some laws that im only too aware of..)...

the protection companies benefit from reducing piracy.. i suggest you take the blinkers off.. also you seem to think all of your ideas apply to the world, they do NOT, different countries, different laws... as for my job, frankly thats none of your business..

you have successfully hijacked the thread, spouted complete and utter nonsense, and are trying to deliberately get a rise out of me now (previously it was from dab...)

cracking encryption is not easy for most people, it is for those skilled in reversing and cryptology.. a field i am quite used to, having been working in it for ~20+ years...

as for 'plenty of online monitoring already'.. sure but we are talking about GAMES and the protections of those games... you keep changing the goal posts to make your points seem valid... as for plenty of online monitoring already... how about the fbi, cia, mi5, mi6 and various other organisations monitoring the internet.. u think they don't have access to your personal information?

so, to clarify, keep your arguments / points on track, on topic, and relative..
the subject is game activation... not bank cards, not malware, not google, and dont think you know everything, there are people out there (including myself) who know a hell of a lot more than you do, so if you don't know something dont cite nonsense.. do some research.. understand the subject...
then the thread might get interesting...

[AstralWanderer]

Originally Posted by TippeX

erm i actually do know what im talking about...a field i am quite used to, having been working in it for ~20+ years...and dont think you know everything, there are people out there (including myself) who know a hell of a lot more than you do...do some research.. understand the subject.

Ah, my humble apologies dear sir for having underestimated your expertise and wisdom on this topic. And thank you for enlightening this thread with well-worded posts including relevant links to back up every point.

[acal3000]

Originally Posted by TippeX

the subject is game activation... not bank cards, not malware, not google, and dont think you know everything, there are people out there (including myself) who know a hell of a lot more than you do, so if you don't know something dont cite nonsense.. do some research.. understand the subject...

I liked this comment Tippex made hope anymod don't if my coment fi too offtopic and I backit up

But I think people that think that know everything is people that know nothing. You learn from everything know about everything but never will know all in the whole. Not even the dorks from the MIT know all

I started using pc on the MS dos 4 dr-dos 5 days the win 3.0 to Vista also Linux distros (I hate windows) I started maybe before several young guys on this forums. On those days and I still live in the middle nowhere anc could use pc when lots of people on my school neighborhood didn't have any know anyone have a laptop no matter how petigious is their school or or if not even work to fix pc on 1995-97 those were really expensive compared with desktops or towers 9 (maybe on those year usa or the european countries didn't this prob but in my middle of nowhere country was) and note I was not rich and I still aint to this date when using my first pc at home

I could like veteran now but others started decades before me and even are more than 18 years since I used my first pc I am still learning even from new users with less posts than me